Wagyu really is wonderful. It is also expensive and one of the most mistreated meats in Australia.
Possibly the worst way to eat it is an a hunking great steak; possibly the best way is to prepare it with care in small quantities, even as sushi.
Charles Greenfield, the owner and chef at Jamon Sushi in South Yarra, has probably worked with more different types of wagyu than anybody else in Australia. And there are more pure and mixed blood wagyu herds here than you’d believe.
Once or twice a year he holds special wagyu weeks. Next week on Wednesday 30th April there is an opportunity for up to eight bloggers to sample what he does at his bar. Usually the cost is $250 but he is prepared to offer a slightly parred down menu for $120 plus drinks.

This time around it is Sher wagyu with a fat marbling score of 9+.
Although this seems expensive it is a bargain bearing in mind the price of the meat. A while ago I was lucky enough to sample his work with Wagyu. You can see here what I wrote on it for The Australian and the pictures here on this blog.
Sitting at the bar as Greenfield prepares the dishes is an educational experience. I’ve probably learnt more about Japanese food eating here than anyhere else although Greenfield’s approach is not traditional.
You’ll find yourself comparing the textures and tastes of different cuts, cooked and raw. And you’ll get to smell that special unmistakable smell of wagyu cooking.
If you are interested let me know in comments. First come first served. And I’m at the front of the queue, which means there are seven places left. And yes, I am paying my way rather than taking a free meal which brings the price down for you.

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Worth it: the $15 wagyu burger.

Now that’s what I call a burger. A Wagyu burger to be precise from Rockpool Bar & Grill at Crown Casino in Melbourne. The bun was more like a brioche in texture. The whole construction is designed to be eaten rather than slip out down my front. There was a thin slice of cheese inside but the real star is the meat, prime wagyu spiked with what can only be wagyu fat packed with all those greate omega 3 oils..

Fat as we all know is the solution that transfers the flavour from the meat to the palate. And boy what flavour that was, the unmistakable flavour of wagyu, creamy, meaty, mouth melting… I whimpered.

At $15 it is an absolute bargain and worth a visit to the the bar or wine bar section (you can’t buy the burger in the restaurant) alone. To even mention any burger joint in the same blog post of this masterpiece would be sacrilege. But hey, I sold my soul to the devil years ago; the burgers from Grill’d are shit in comparison (probably because they are healthy burgers) despite being half the price.

We arrived at Rockpool at 10.45 at night after a very poor and longwinded staging of Othello and this burger uplifted my whole evening.

Of course, by the time we’d ordered chips and three glasses of red the bill was $71 for about 45 minutes time in the restaurant. For burgers alone that’s about 66 cents a minute but with chips and wine that’s $1.57. Considering I had to wait five minutes in line in McDonald’s last week simply to buy a $4 and quite nasty takeaway to deliver to a very hungover friend (seriously it wasn’t me or Jak) the Rockpool burger is great value.

Last night was my second visit to Rockpool. I’d resisted for six months purely because of my own prejudices about casino eating. How wrong I was.

All is calm but busy in the open kitchen.

Inside the restaurant: some of the customers who know how to hold their cutlery.

It has a great cosmopolitan feel like something from New York. Or on more familar territory from Conran in London. The service was friendly on my first visit, if not a little overstretched at some points.

The seafood here is fresh out of the acquarium. At first I was shocked at how quickly the live scallops arrived all the way from the Melbourne Acquarium on the other side of the Yarra. How many divers did the restaurant employ I asked. Was there any chance you’d get some of the giant squid once it thaws out?

But no, Rockpool has it’s own acquarium. Although the scallops were described as live they were very docile. I was worried they may hop onto the carpet which is awful because these shell fish really pick up the hairs.

Live, possibly dying or already dead scallops.

Next we each had steak tartare. Although spicy and tasty, it was of the ugly variety, the size of a small liquidized rodent nestling in a lettuce leaf (which is a lot better than France-Soir where it is the size of a domestic cat nestling in something near the size of a whole lettuce).

Steak tartare – tasty but of the ugly variety

To be quite honest I’ve only popped in for two quick meals and haven’t gone for the full blown experience but from what I’ve experienced and tasted so far I like Rockpool very much. It is a very different experience to my last pre-blogging visit to its Sydney sister I really did feel like I’d been treated like shit.

Finally it is time for the bill. Simon our sommelier who took us towards some excellent wines takes my card. And I am recognised. I’m not recognised for my column on the Herald Sun, for writing in The Australian or any of the reviewing I’ve done for restaurant guides.

I’m recognised for my blog. It turns out his girlfriend is Jackie from Eating with Jack who also works in hospitality.

One month from my second blog anniversary I now reflect how blogging has evolved in Melbourne, to the point that bloggers are recognised, regularly reviewing and discovering new restaurants before the main media. Many restaurants such as Interlude and Fenix are even courting bloggers. But as I often say that’s another story and coming soon.

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I mentioned in my column today that Jamon (3 Murphy St, South Yarra +61 9804 5710) was between Tuesday 8 and Saturday 12 may holding one of it’s Wagyu weeks with lunch at $120 and supper $250.

Last year I wrote about one of the lunches for the Australian’s Travel & indulgence section. You can find the full story here and the pictorial evidence on this blog here.

The thing I really enjoyed about the meal was the jorney is textures and tastes he took us upon. At the time I said:

“Appreciative noises fill the room. Meanwhile, Greenfield’s chopsticks pluck cold soba noodles and fold them into bowls with seaweed and jellied ox-tail soup. Cooked tail contrasts with sashimi of rib and the slime of woodear mushrooms. Each ingredient retains its flavour. The first bite of noodles – almost al dente but not quite – is crunchy. The cooked meat is soft; the raw, chewy.
“More noise and Greenfield hits us with another dish. He is improvising now with a handful of morels, lightly poached. He chops raw eye fillet to stuff the hollow mushroom – another simpler version of tartare. Into 300-year-old Japanese cups, he places the stuffed fungi with a little mushroom flavoured stock.”

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The hands on approach with Wagyu

I was invited back to a wagyu lunch at Jamon (3 Murphy St, South Yarra, Vic 3141 +61 3 9804 5710) by the chef and owner Charles a couple of months ago and should have posted this earlier. His point, which I wrote about for The Australian’s Indulgence section, was that wagyu is not some generic meat; it should as with other meats be appreciated by the cut. The Australian’s story says it all. Once again I was taken on a journey where I actual discovered something new about food and I was challenged in what I ate. It’s not often a restaurant does this and if you haven’t already been to Jamon I suggest you pay a visit.

Shitake mushroom tartare

Tongue: among the best I’ve ever eaten

Chuck steak, not tuna!

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When the cast of Hollywood tucked in to beef burgers after this years 77th Academy Awards, it was made from Blackmore Wagyu Beef. When the first Yarra Valley truffles arrived at the Botanical restaurant in Melbourne, chef Paul Wilson served it with Blackmore Wagyu Beef. And if you visit what Gourmet Traveller has rated as Australia’s top restaurant, Vue de Monde in Melbourne, you’ll be served the same brand of beef.
This prized meat is the culmination of a lifetimes work for fifth generation farmer David Blackmore.
He started his working life as a stock agent where he’d hoped to pinch one good idea from each farm he visited and return home. He says: “But I still haven’t got home to the family farm. And I won’t, it’s been sold.”
This led Blackmore to build his own business the clever way. He leased land and focused on genetics, commercialising cattle embryo transfer internationally.
(more…)

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A restaurant in China that advertised illegal tiger meat dishes was found instead to be selling donkey flesh marinated in tiger urine.

Here at Tomato we’re thinking of going long on donkey. For a start they are deeply unfashionable, which really appeals as we are not just jumping onto some bandwagon like Wagyu beef. And they are quite cheap. Try the other other other red meat. Stranger things have happened with horses.

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